This story follows on from 'Anamnesis.' Brief synopsis if you haven't read that story - No longer travelling with the 'fam', the Doctor tried to regain the memories wiped from her brain. She failed but made a new friend, Serene, an orphan raised within the Cerebral Order (a sort of combination of a university and a monastic order). On their first meeting, Serene accidentally absorbed some of the Doctor's memories through her memory recall device, and although the Doctor managed to remove most of them, some remained. After travelling together and having adventures for a while, they met Missy, who 'gifted' Serene some of Missy's own memories to further complicate matters. Both the Doctor and Serene have accepted that they may never find out the truth of their pasts, but of course, when is it ever that simple?
Ipseity
1.
The Doctor and Serene wandered through the Millefiori Galleria, enjoying the way the buzz and hurry swirled around them, not engulfing them but invigorating nonetheless. So many voices - even translated through the TARDIS, it was obvious there were many different languages and dialects. So many species, all with their own business, drama, gossip and joy, coming from far and wide to this city-sized bazaar to buy, trade, meet or just to soak up the atmosphere. The amber sun shone through the stained glass roof, throwing multi-coloured light onto everything below.
"This is one of my favourite places so far," Serene sighed happily.
"Not just the stalls, but the… what's the word? Ambience?"
"Sounds about right," the Doctor agreed.
"The reason this market started was part of a peace process. Once a truce had been called, the first thing the communities did was start to trade. While all the politicians and the military leaders were arguing about territorial boundaries, and disarmament treaties, the regular people were meeting each other to find out what they needed the most and how they could supply it. That was several generations ago, but the truce held. There're no weapons here, no fights and it's not enforced by armies, or police. The people themselves uphold the truce, because they know how important it is."
"There's hope for us all, maybe. Thank you for bringing me here, Doctor. It's nice to see places where there's hope."
"Most important thing in the universe, hope. There's some bad history here, and it's not always like this on the future, but yeah. It's good to see places where they've worked stuff out."
They spent the whole day exploring, talking with stall-holders, eating the strangest food they could find, puzzling out the purposes of the weirdest objects piled high on the most tucked-away stalls. Serene's knowledge of alien races was pretty good for someone with so sheltered an upbringing, but she was still surprised by some of the traders, and was fascinated by the Trees of Cheem. Having never even heard of a race of sentient, humanoid tree beings, she could have spent several days talking with them, but there was always something else to distract her. The young Catkind acrobats put on little pop-up performances wherever there was space, delighting their audiences, and the Doctor was thrilled to find some independent Ood, running their own trading business.
Conscious of Missy's sniping criticism of her clothing, the Doctor bought a few new tops and accessories. She mostly stuck with the rainbow theme, had no intention of changing everything, unless it was necessary to fit in somewhere, but no harm in having a bit more to choose from.
Serene wrapped the multi-hued shawl she'd just bought around her shoulders.
"Loving the bright colours, aren't you?" The Doctor said, with a smile.
Serene grinned back, smoothing the skirt of her teal dress.
"It's the choice, more than anything. Years I wore that lay sister uniform! It was that or nothing, and believe me, I tried that when I was very little, and it didn't go over too well either."
Her eye was caught by a display of jangly silver jewellery.
"And pretty things… I can't get enough of those either."
The Doctor, catching sight of herself in the mirror by the jewellery, ran a hand self-consciously over her hair, now tinted a light pink - rose gold, the woman running the stall had called it.
'Still can't believe I let Serene talk me into doing that,' she thought. 'But then again, we came here to try new things. Maybe I could try red next time. Finally I could be ginger.'
Serene picked out a small star on a short chain, so it lay between her collar bones. The Doctor had gifted her her own money to spend, digging through the collection of random currencies stored in the TARDIS to find what would be accepted here. Serene had taken a while to get the hang of money, and found haggling utterly incomprehensible, but as long as she felt both parties were getting a fair deal, she was happy. As Serene put on her new necklace, the Doctor pulled her hair away from the cuff on her own ear.
"Nice. Goes with mine."
"It seemed fitting. We travel among the stars."
They continued wandering, no pressures or demands, just enjoying the variety, the diversity, finding things that neither of them had ever seen before. But just as the Doctor was getting into an in-depth retelling of how she'd once visited a market that later turned out to be a dormant sentient creature, on whose back traders had set up their stalls, she realised Serene was being very quiet. She turned, and her friend was nowhere to be seen.
"How long've I been talking to myself? Saw something shiny, I suppose."
She began retracing her steps, but once she went back around the corner and saw Serene's multi-coloured shawl lying on the ground, she started to get worried. Getting distracted and wandering off was one thing - and she wouldn't be the first to do that - but it wasn't like Serene to just drop something she valued.
The Doctor picked it up and approached the nearby stalls.
"Excuse me, did you see my friend? She passed by a minute ago, dark hair, golden skin? She was carrying this?"
But no luck. The market was too busy for anyone to notice individual people, much less remember where they'd gone. The Doctor went back to the stalls they'd bought items from, but none of them had seen Serene since their first visit. Now the Doctor was getting seriously worried. She pulled out her sonic and began scanning the area, hoping to pick up a trace. It remembered Serene's recall device, could usually connect to it but it was getting nothing, and that was really worrying. She ran on, calling out Serene's name, asking anyone who'd stop if they'd seen her, but still nothing.
As she looped back around, near where she'd started, she noticed a hidden little back alleyway, where all the stalls were shuttered closed, and there, on the ground, was Serene's recall device. Or at least, what was left of it. The wrist part was twisted out of shape and smashed like it had been wrenched off, then stamped on, repeatedly and deliberately. If Serene wouldn't have dropped the wrap, there was nothing that would have made her abandon her gadget, not willingly anyway.
Fear and concern flitted through the Doctor. Someone had taken her friend, by force. Who would do such a thing, and why? And here, of all places? The truce made this Galleria a safe, peaceful place, and everyone who came here should know better than to try abducting people from its streets. So whoever had taken Serene, they were either from very far away and didn't think any consequences could catch them up, or they were dangerous enough to not care at all. But why target Serene?
A rogue's gallery of enemies past, present and future ran though the Doctor's mind - who would try something like this, and what was the likelihood they would hurt Serene? If her friend was bait for a trap - and again, it wouldn't be the first time someone'd tried that - then surely there'd be a clue, a ransom note, something to follow, but the lack of any information made her dismiss that. Whoever had taken Serene didn't want to leave any trace, and they didn't want to be followed. That was really worrying.
The Doctor checked in with the Galleria organisers, but got nothing. There were no security cameras inside the market, only on the entrances and exits, and Serene hadn't gone through any of those since they'd arrived. No-one had reported witnessing an abduction, either.
'So, add 'can take someone from a busy street in broad daylight without being seen' to the list,' the Doctor thought.
She returned to the TARDIS, half-hoping to find her friend waiting for her there, all one big misunderstanding! But how often did that happen? She accessed the TARDIS' records from when it had synced with Serene's memory implant, using that to start a search, hoping to connect with that part, seeing as how it couldn't easily be taken out. But it had either been deactivated or they were cloaking it somehow, so they really didn't want to be found. The Doctor paced the console room, running through her thoughts until she reached something that made her pause.
"I've been looking at this wrong," she said aloud. "I've been thinking that this is about me, that someone took Serene because of something I did, or to get my attention. But what if that isn't it at all? What if this is nothing to do with me?"
She set the co-ordinates and the TARDIS dematerialised.
As it rematerialised, she was out of the doors before the wheezing, groaning noise of the engines had even faded.
"Doctor?"
Professor Leyser, a middle-aged, shaven-headed Black woman, got up from her work. She sounded pleased at the Doctor's sudden appearance in her lab, months after their last encounter, when she'd assisted the Doctor in getting her memory problems under control.
"What brings you back to the Order?"
The other woman glanced over the Doctor's shoulder, and she realised the Professor was looking to see if Serene was with her.
"I need your help. Someone took Serene, and I can't trace her."
"Took?" Professor Leyser was alarmed. "What do you mean?"
"I mean took. Abducted. Right from under my nose. We were at the Millefiori Galleria and she just vanished."
The Doctor stood right in front of Professor Leyser, eyes boring into hers.
"Tell me everything you know about her. Who brought her here as a baby, and why?"
The Professor dropped her gaze, tugging at her blue tunic.
"I don't know. She was a toddler before I even met her-"
"But you do know something? Tell me, Professor. I need to find her, I don't know what kind of danger she could be in."
The Professor hesitated.
"I'll take you to the archives. Show you everything I know."
She led the Doctor to a room which was banks of monitors and interfaces, built around a central processing unit. The Professor sat at one of the monitors and accessed the personnel files for the Order, searching through for the recordings of Serene's arrival.
"There isn't much. Serene's seen all of this."
What followed was a brief series of films from security cameras. A cloaked figure, hood pulled over its head, departed the spaceport, toting a baby in a carrier. They headed straight for the Order's reception, waited for a quiet moment to deposit the baby carrier outside the front door, and hurried back to the spaceport. Then they vanished into the crowd.
"The Chancellors ordered an investigation, before they decided to allow Serene to stay, as a ward. The person who brought her here was travelling under a false name, using fake ID."
The Professor brought up a picture of a woman, same golden skin and dark hair as Serene but with no other resemblance.
"They covered their tracks well. The ticket was paid for in cash, we don't know if this is even their real face. No-one here had any idea who she could be. I know of a few planets they could be from but…"
The Professor trailed off.
"What? What do you know?"
The Professor sighed, and brought up a different record.
"The Zinariyan Alliance. Around the time Serene was born, they had a particularly nasty civil war, one that went on for years. A lot of people were killed because they were seen to be on the wrong side, and it's likely that's where Serene came from."
"What was the war about?"
"Government, to be simplistic. The Zinariyan Alliance is made up from three planets and their orbiting moons, with a number of space stations. The war was about who got to rule what, if they should remain together or if any should get their independence. It got… messy."
"And Serene?"
The Professor shrugged.
"I don't have anything to go on, but if her family were under threat, or maybe they'd already been killed, then perhaps whoever brought her here thought the Cerebral Order was neutral enough that she'd be safe, no matter what the result of the war was."
The Doctor leaned over her shoulder, reading through the record rapidly.
"I don't think I've ever been out that way. I've heard the name, but not much more. You think her family were targeted for some reason?"
"Maybe they were important, to one side or the other."
"Important enough to track her down and abduct her twenty years later?"
More pieces of the puzzle slotted together in the Doctor's head.
"Wait, when the Nevedi were trying to invade, you said there'd been an attack before, when Serene was a baby… they wanted something kept here."
The Professor avoided the Doctor's gaze.
"I thought they meant knowledge, like the Nevedi were after… was it Serene they wanted?"
"I don't know."
"I don't believe you."
The Doctor swivelled the chair the other woman was sitting in so that they were face to face, leaning in with her hands on the armrests. The Doctor's expression made it clear how seriously she was taking this.
"I wasn't involved," Leyser replied, awkwardly. "I wasn't even a professor then, just a researcher. No-one would have told me anything."
"Don't lie to me! If my friend is in trouble, then I need to help her, and I can't do that if people lie to me."
"That's what some people said," the Professor confessed. "The attackers - they never identified themselves, but there were rumours it was the baby they were after. People love a mystery and they love gossip, even at an academic organisation like this. The Chancellors never admitted anything, kept the whole thing quiet. The attack was repelled, and they didn't try again, so if it was her, then she was safe, so what did it matter?"
"Well, it matters now. But I don't have time for this. I need to find her."
The Doctor stormed out, stopping only to pick up a new wrist recall device, in the hope she could use the TARDIS to sync it with Serene's implant and find her that way. If Professor Leyser was correct, then the Zinariyan Alliance was probably where Serene was being taken, but she couldn't rely on that, had to try and intercept. What did they want with her?
Serene awoke to the sensation of movement.
She regained consciousness slowly, feeling dazed and lethargic as whatever sedative she'd been given began to wear off, but it also partly held back the panic as she tried to move and realised she was tied to a chair. It was being wheeled along but she couldn't see anything, realising there was some kind of hood over her head. Even the drug couldn't stop her from flashing back to her time as a prisoner on Ksako, being experimented on by the Nevedi doctor. No, not again…
"Doctor?" she called, her voice made drowsy by the medication. "Doctor, are you here?"
There was some muffled speech nearby, and the chair paused.
"Nearly home, ma'am," said a voice by her ear.
'Home?' Serene thought as they hurried on. What was that supposed to mean? Whose home? The only home she'd ever known was the estate of the Order, although she'd never really thought if it that way, didn't exactly miss it, not while she was travelling with the Doctor.
A sudden jolt ran through her at the thought that maybe her captor was telling the truth and a feeling of dread began to rise within Serene. When she'd told the Doctor she hadn't wanted to know the truth of her background, it hadn't been a lie, not exactly. There had always been strong curiosity, of course, but now that it seemed she might be about to get her answers, the fear that she wouldn't like what she found was stronger. That she'd been forcibly abducted was only enforcing the fear. And where was the Doctor? Had they taken her too, or worse?
She drifted in and out of consciousness until the chair came to a halt and the hood came off. Artificial light right into her eyes made her flinch and screw up her face. Her eyesight had recovered from the damage Dr Milton had done, but she was still a little sensitive to bright lights. She bit down on rising fear as best she could, aware that struggling would do nothing, trying to still herself.
"It's all right," said a voice, a hand laid on her arm. "You're safe."
Serene opened her eyes a crack, squinting at whoever was speaking.
"Safe? How?"
"This is just a precaution; calm down, it's for your own good."
Fear turned to fury, and Serene had no intention of calming down just because someone told her to.
"What's for my own good? Being abducted? Tied up? Who are you? What's going on?"
"You've been restrained so you don't hurt yourself."
Serene's eyesight returned enough to make out the person in front of her. A woman, not much older than herself and for the first time in Serene's life, she was looking at someone who looked like her. Not identical, but a similar golden skintone and long black hair. Her eyes were a lighter blue, and the girl seemed hesitant to meet her gaze.
'And I can understand them.' Serene realised. 'Is that the TARDIS? She's still connected to me somehow? I hope so…'
"Now, Nurse. Step back, please," said another, firmer voice and the young woman obeyed. The new speaker also had the same golden skin; a man in maybe his late forties, with cropped black hair. He wore little silver glasses and had a superior air to him as he regarded Serene.
"You, young lady, have proved spectacularly difficult to find. When we first heard that you'd gone from the Order, we thought we had a chance, but where did you go?"
Serene's feeling of dread spiked, all her worst fears spinning inside her brain.
"You… you know who I am?"
"Of course. I know more about you than you know yourself, I'll wager."
This particularly smug sentence pushed Serene's anger level with her fear, but it was a struggle to not give in to either. The man continued, seemingly unaware of her turmoil.
"You may call me Arran. I'm told you use the name 'Serene.' That's good. We can use that, it's quite proper. Unfortunately, you never had a formal naming ceremony, so we don't know what your parents intended for you."
"My… you know who my parents are?"
Arran seemed a little surprised, but he didn't lose the patronising air.
"So you were never informed? That is surprising. You did grow up in an institution dedicated to knowledge, yes?"
Serene's heart, already beating faster, began to pound. Whoever these people - her people? - were, they knew who she was. They knew. They'd always known she was at the Order, and they'd managed to find her again, despite her becoming a time-traveller. Whatever their plan was, this was something a long time coming.
"Tell me what's going on? And what happened to the Doctor?"
"Who?"
"My friend. She was with me, at the Millefiori Galleria."
As she said this, Serene realised with a start that her wrist device was missing. Had they known it could be used to locate her? She had to assume that they did.
Arran made a dismissive gesture.
"Unimportant. Now, you will be informed of the full details later, but it's best you learn some now."
His tone became grandiose, as if making a great speech before an audience.
"The history of our people, the Zinariya, is long and complex, but before we were the Alliance, we were ruled by Regnants. A sovereign family, a bloodline that can be traced back for centuries. It was thought to have ended with the uprising, but it did not. Because of you."
And just like that, there it was.
Of all the scenarios she'd imagined, working with the slight information she had, this might not have been the absolute worst, but it was definitely up there. Serene stared back at Arran in stony silence. This puzzled him.
"Do you understand me? You are the last true Regnant of the Zinariya and we have worked very hard for many years to restore you to your throne."
There was a moment's pause, then Serene finally lost her temper.
"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard!"
"I beg your pardon-" he began but Serene cut him off.
"No, this is completely ridiculous! I don't care if my ancestors were king and queen of the whole universe! None of this means a thing, and I won't be a part of any of your utter nonsense!"
Arran was rather taken aback, but quickly pulled himself back together.
"Look, this has come as a shock to you, but it will all make sense soon enough, and you'll realise you have no choice but to accept-"
"I'll do no such thing! And why, in all the galaxies, would the people of this Alliance accept me? I haven't set foot on any of those planets since I was an infant, and nobody has any idea of who I am!"
"The bloodline is what is important, and they will respect that."
Serene took a deep breath, exhaled slowly then sat back, trying to regain her patience. No sense in wasting energy struggling just then. She had to have faith that the Doctor was okay, and that she would find her, rescue her.
'I should probably work on escaping in the meantime,' she thought.
"But why?" Serene said aloud. "Why would you even want to restore a hereditary ruling family, after everything that happened in the civil war?"
"It wasn't a civil war!" Arran was outraged. "It was an uprising that should never have succeeded! The bloodline is sacred, the most important thing in our empire and it should be preserved. We may have lost you for twenty years, but we will re-establish the rule of the Regnant over the Zinariya."
Alongside Serene's anger was a sense of escalating horror. This was worse than she'd imagined. At first, it had sounded like these people were merely delusional, clinging to an outdated and nonsensical ideal of hereditary rule. But the more the man talked, the more this sounded like an actual battle plan, that they genuinely meant to restart a war and to put her in the middle of it, as some absurd figurehead.
"No," she said, as determined as she could. "I refuse. I won't have anything to do with this."
Arran folded his arms, resolute in his convictions.
"You do not have a choice. You are of the bloodline, and you must take your place."
"I will not! Let me go!"
Despite her attempts to control herself, Serene began to struggle against the restraints.
"I don't believe in any of this, and I won't play any part in instigating a war!"
"You need time to process this, I understand. The other Architects of the Revolution will be here soon-"
"The what?"
Arran ignored her incredulity.
"Taking your place as Regnant will require some preparation, and we have taken that into account. This is a transitional period. A team of assistants has been assigned to begin creating your new image, to plan for your future."
Arran gestured to the attendant nurse, who gave her another dose of sedative. This one was different; she didn't lose consciousness, but her energy drained immediately, her muscles felt weak and she couldn't struggle anymore. The wheelchair she was tied to was turned around so she was looking out the window.
They were in some sort of apartment, overlooking a open communal area and as the drug took hold, Serene forgot why she was there. It was a beautiful garden, graceful towering architecture combined with living plants in a way that looked like a forest had grown up within and around a modern city.
"We are currently on a space station within the Alliance," Arran continued.
Distracted, Serene wondered what the planets were like, if this was part of the Alliance. She couldn't remember much from what she'd read, back in the Order, seemingly a million years ago. Under other circumstances, this looked to be the kind of place she'd have happily visited, and she wondered what it would be like to wander around down there. And what about the people? Did any of them agree with what her captors were planning? Did they even know that she existed, much less want her to be some figurehead for an uprising?
"We have preparations to finish before you can be moved planetside, but you should get to know what you will rule."
Arran's words snapped her back to reality. If this movement began, then this beautiful park, this whole station and the worlds below could end up engulfed in war, all over again, and that woke the anger back up in Serene, struggling against the sedative that was meant to calm her. She wanted nothing to do with this.
But a chime from the door interrupted them, and Arran went to greet the people as they came in. No doubt these were the - what had he called them? The architects of the revolution - an even more absurd name than what they were planning. The ones hoping to lead the movement, to use her to get what they wanted. There were armed guards too, who came to stand beside her; this ludicrous conspiracy appeared frighteningly well organised, not just some crackpots loyal to an almost extinct bloodline, but an actual movement.
While the architects talked, Serene forced herself to examine her feelings, trying to keep calm. Getting locked up was becoming something of a habit, although she couldn't blame this one on the Doctor and her unbridled enthusiasm for getting into - and causing - trouble. She could try and escape, before this got too far, there was still hope.
If someone had come to her at the Order and told her all this, maybe she would have been interested in at least hearing them out, getting some answers. But now she was faced with this all, she found she didn't want to know any more, not a word. And it wasn't just travelling with the Doctor that had changed her, but also having taken in some of the Doctor's memories, which had a habit of manifesting at moments like this.
"You think that could destroy me? You think that makes me lesser?" the Doctor threw back at the man who was trying to torment her. "It makes me more!"
Serene had never told the Doctor that she remembered that specific memory. Then she'd met Missy, who was essentially the same person as that man, and now she had some of Missy's memories too, complicating things further.
Serene and the Doctor had talked about her friend's lost memories, and Serene had decided that if the Doctor could live with that, then she herself could live without ever knowing who she 'really' was. Only now that choice had been taken away.
At least she wasn't currently being tortured, or experimented on, or about to be burned alive - perspective helped a little. She had to find a way out, or a way to contact the Doctor, and if she couldn't, then she had to trust that the Doctor would find her, and together they would somehow find a way to stop this from happening.
Disclaimer: anything you recognise isn't mine, etc, etc.
I was playing around with the trope of 'the companion is someone special', and wanted to go with a situation where they didn't want to be anything special, but are being forced into it, with the story not yet having any relation to the Doctor for once. I've avoided doing much with Serene's story before so I could develop her a bit more naturally, and hopefully avoid any Mary Sue cliches.
The Doctor dying her hair pink was because there are some pictures of Jodie's Doctor where the light makes it look like her hair is a kind of rose gold, and I thought it was the kind of thing she'd do. :)